


The Trickster

by iloveitblue



Series: Prompts [110]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: M/M, lil bit of violence, maybe stabbing the chest or smth, supernatural!AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-10-12
Updated: 2015-01-31
Packaged: 2018-02-20 21:33:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,201
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2443907
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iloveitblue/pseuds/iloveitblue
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The one where Clint and Tasha are hunters ala Sam and Dean</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> "It’s the librarian." Natasha told him.

"You’re kind of librarian or my kind of librarian?" Clint asked.

Natasha ignored him “Fury says our usual stuff won’t work on him.”

"Then how the hell are we supposed to gank this thing?" 

Natasha took out two stakes and a jar of blood. She dipped both of them one at a time into the jar and handed one to Clint. “With this.” She studied the tip of the stake against the light and smirked. 

"Who’s blood is that?"

"Mrs. Watson."

"The old lady from down the street?"

"Our first victim."

Clint nodded in understanding. “Blood of a victim. Nice.” 

Natasha led the way to the college library as Clint covered her back. She was the only one who’s seen the librarian in the first place so it’d be useless for Clint to lead anyway. They entered the library as quietly as they could, the place was deserted so every step they took seemed squeakier than it was during the day. 

Natasha gave him the sign to go separate and corner the trickster somewhere. It shouldn’t be hard to spot. The library  _was_  closed after all, so the only one here was supposed to be-

"Phil?" 

The figure in one of the aisles looked over to Clint, a book in hand. “Clint? What are you doing here? It’s way past closing time.” 

Clint hastily made his way to the man, concealing the bloody stake in his jacket and grabbed Phil’s arm, dragging him away. “It’s not safe here. We should get you out.”

"Clint wait." Phil pulled away. "What are you talking about? What’s going on?"

"I can’t explain it but you have to get out of here, as fast as you can if you don’t wanna die."

"Are you threatening me?"

"No! I just- I-" Clint groaned. Why the hell did everybody think he was threatening them when all he’s trying to do is get them to safety? "It’s just- It’s not safe here, okay? Just… trust me."

Clint could see that Phil was starting to get scared, and based on what he’s seen the trickster do to its victims, he should be. Clint took Phil’s hand in his and lead the man toward the exit. They were almost out too when the sound of clicking heels against the hardwood floors made Clint turn around. 

Natasha stood there, stake in hand and glaring at them. “What are you doing?” Natasha demanded.

"Look, Phil, Tasha. Tasha, Phil. I’ll do proper introductions later. Right now, we need to get Phil out of here before the Trickster-"

"He  _is_ the Trickster.” Natasha glared at Phil.

Clint felt the slight squeeze Phil gave his hand. Saw the fear in his eyes when the stake in Natasha’s hand was ready for him. “Tasha, no. He’s- He’s not the Trickster. He’s- He’s Phil! He’s a librarian! He’s harmless.” Clint tried for a laugh but it came out a little too breathy.

"Look me in the eye and tell me you believe all that crap." Natasha dared. "He’s been hiding under your nose, Clint. He’s deceiving you." 

Phil turned to Clint, panic clear as day in his eyes. “What’s she talking about, Clint?” He asked him.

"Tasha… Please. It isn’t him." Clint begged, standing in front of Phil.

"Clint, don’t make me do this." Natasha stepped closer and the two men took a step back. "We can’t let him go. At least not alive. He’s going to keep killing people! And he’s doing it for fun! You know what we have to do."

"But I keep telling you. It’s  _not_  him. I’ve seen him. He’s- He’s normal. He didn’t kill anybody.”

"You don’t know that Clint."

"Yes I do. Why won’t you listen to me?"

"Why won’t  _you_  listen to  _me?!”_  Natasha yelled. “He’s killed off people in this town and he’s not going to stop! Not anytime soon! Not unless we kill him.” Clint stood his ground and Natasha shook her head. “Forget it. I don’t need your permission.” 

"I won’t let you." 

"Clint. What’s going on?" Phil asked him.

"She’s going to try and stab you in the heart." Clint explained without taking his eyes off of Natasha. "If you die because of the blood, you’re what we came to this town to kill. If you die because of the stabbing, you’re human."

"So either way I die?!" 

"No. I’m going to protect you. She won’t get that bloody stake anywhere near you."

"Blood? who’s blood?"

"Blood of the first victim."

"Mrs. Watson?! What- How’d you even get that?"

"I- We have our sources. We- wait a minute." Clint turned to face Phil and Natasha stood a little bit down. "Mrs. Watson’s death was never mentioned in any of the news. How’d you know she’s dead?"

Phil panicked a little bit more. “I- There were rumors! and I thought- Maybe-” Phil sighed, all pretenses of panic gone. “Damn it. I just had to open my big mouth.”

Clint stepped away from the man, taking out his stake as Natasha sided next to him. “You’re the trickster.” Clint all but whispered.

"Ding Ding Ding Ding Ding! We have a winner! Tell the man what he’s won, Sharon!" Phil grinned at them.

From behind Clint and Natasha, a woman spoke. Blonde hair, pearly white smile, silver gown and a spotlight that followed her around. “Well Phil, Clint has one this amazing offer! Either he flees this town and live, or stay here with Natasha and die.”

Natasha turned to Phil. “You really think you could kill us?”

"If I wanted to, you’d be on the floor by now." Phil cocked his head. "See how that works?"

"But we’re not." Natasha smirked. "Meaning you’re holding back."

Phil’s smile faltered a little and his jaw locked but it was gone as soon as it appeared. “Maybe I am, maybe I’m not. Who’s to say?”

"Go ahead then. Kill us." Natasha told him, a smirk growing.

"Tasha." Clint warned.

"You can’t, can you?" Natasha cocked an eyebrow and smiled. "You don’t want to kill us. Or at least, you don’t want to hurt Clint."

Phil’s smile turned into a frown. He snapped his fingers and Clint was suddenly on the floor - coughing out blood and wheezing. Natasha bent down to him to try and calm the blonde down. 

"Oops." Phil smirked.

Natasha stood up and stomped toward him, stake at hand. “You  _bastard._ " her wrist was then caught by strong hands and she was pinned against someone’s chest. She looked at her assailant and almost immediately, all color drained from her face. "Bucky…"

"I see you two know each other." Phil grinned and walked towards her. "Such a shame what happened to dear ol’ James here." He stopped right in front of Natasha and smirked. "If what James told me was true, he died because you were too bullheaded to listen to him, charged into a house full of demons, where he died trying to haul your pretty ass out." Natasha struggled in Bucky’s grip. She was going to kill this guy. 

"Shut up." She hissed at him.

"or what? You’re going to kill me? I highly doubt that." 

"No. but I will." Clint grabbed Phil’s shoulder and turned him around before stabbing Phil in the heart.

Phil stared at Clint then down at his chest then back up at Clint, his jaw quivered and blood started to drip from the side of his lip as it did his chest. He took one final breath before slumping into Clint’s arms - taking all of the illusions he put up. 

It was done.

Clint lay him down gently on the floor, not that it made a difference now, and Natasha gave him a soft pat on the shoulder. “We need to go. Before anyone sees us with the body.”

Clint nodded. He placed his hand over Phil’s eyes to close it one final time and stood up to follow Natasha out.

Once the two were gone, a figure appeared out of nowhere and stared at the body. He grabbed the stake and pulled it out, making the body slowly disappear. 

Phil studied the stake and scoffed. Why couldn’t he just have killed Clint before the hunter had a chance to talk to him? And now, it was too late; he couldn’t do it. He doesn’t want to kill Clint.


	2. Chapter 2

Clint opened his eyes and sprang up when he hears the song from the radio. _Heat of the moment by Asia._  He takes a cursory glance around and sees Natasha lacing up her boots. 

"Rise and shine, Clinton." She teases. But Clint doesn’t listen. He takes another look at the room to find that it was the same as before.

"Tasha." Clint says.

She bobs her head softly along with the song, mouthing the lyrics as she finishes up her other boot. “Aw, Come on. You love this song.” She reaches out to max the volume on the tiny radio and Clint watches in horror. 

This. This was the same day as yesterday. Or at least Clint thinks it is. Maybe that yesterday was a dream. Maybe Clint had had too much to drink and was having a nightmare. A nightmare about- about Natasha. Losing her. Thank god, it was just a dream. Clint didn’t know what he’d do if he ever actually lost Natasha.

So far, things have progressed the same way it did yesterday - or at least the way Clint remembers his dream.

Clint stood beside Natasha as she gargled. She was still gargling even after Clint finished. He stared at her and she stared at him from the corner of her eyes. “Are you okay?” She asked after spitting out the water. 

"I don’t- I just-"

"Use your words, Clint." She teased again, taking her make-up bag and riffling through its contents.

"I had a weird dream." Clint tells her, remembering this day all too well. Natasha’s going to use the eyeliner, then the mascara, then the lip gloss. She’s going to smack her lips and she’s going to smile, zip up her make-up bag and search for her gun in the pit she calls a tote.

"Yeah?" Natasha asks, even as she puts the eyeliner on. "commitment or a job?"

Clint frowns.

—-

They enter the same diner, and Clint watches as everything he saw in his dream come to life. They sit in the same booth and Natasha notices the same menu item. “Hey, Tuesday. Pig in a poke.” She tells him.

"It’s Tuesday?" Whatever Clint drank the night before, he swears off of it. He can’t even remember the date.

Natasha watches him carefully before she nods. Clint frowns in confusion. 

"Are you two ready?" the same woman takes their order. Clint just stares at her so Natasha tells her their order.

"Yes, he’ll have the special, side of bacon. I’ll have the short stack. 2 coffees. Thank you." The woman leaves with a wary glance at Clint.

Natasha puts her arm over the couch and glances at nothing in particular. “I’m telling you Clint. This job is too small. We should be out there hunting for Maria.” Clint just frowns at everything he sees. Natasha snaps her fingers in front of him and leans forward. “Hey. You sure you’re okay?”

"Y-Yeah. I-" Clint exhales, frustrated. "You don’t- You don’t remember any of this?"

"Remember what?"

"This. Today. Like, Like its happened before?"

Natasha just narrows her eyes at him like he was talking crazy. Well, more than the usual they’re spouting at each other. “Like deja vu?”

"Not like deja vu. Like- like we’re living the same day all over again."

Natasha nods. “Yeah. Deja-“

"No! Don’t say that word." Clint closes his eyes for a second and collects himself. Natasha was probably right. Just deja vu. 

"Here’s your coffee." The woman comes over with a tray and places their drinks in front of them. Clint only had a second before the hot sauce fell. Instinctively, he caught it, earning him a giant grin from the woman, followed by a thanks.

"Nice reflexes." Natasha says to him.

—-

"You don’t believe me." Clint tells her.

"You’re right. I don’t."

"Look, we were at the mystery spot, and then…" Clint trails off. Not sure if he should continue.

"And then what?"

"Then I woke up." Clint conveniently skips over the part where Natasha gets shot in the chest with a shotgun. "That’s it. The mystery spot. That’s got to be it."

"All right. We’ll go tonight after hours. It’ll be nice and quiet and we can take a long look."

"Wait, what? No." Clint stops her. "We’ll go now. Business hours. It’ll be crowded." Clint tries for a smile. She just stares at him like he’s got two heads.

"My god, you’re weird."

"Tasha." 

"Fine. We’ll go now." She rolls her eyes at him and crosses the street. She doesn’t make it across the street as a car speeds by and hits her.

—-

Natasha dies. 

Over and over again. A hundred times. A hundred different ways. He’s tried every single possible way and he’s tried telling Natasha every single detail. Every way he could to save her. 

But nothing fucking works.

It’s always the same. The same diner, the same street, the same scenes, the same- wait.

Natasha stops in her tracks and looks back at Clint. “What’s wrong?”

Clint tracks the man with his eyes. “A hundred Tuesdays he’s had maple syrup and all of a sudden he decides he wants strawberry?”

"What? The man can’t have strawberry syrup for breakfast? It’s a free country." Natasha tells him.

"No. Not in this diner. Nothing ever changes. Except me."

—-

Clint wakes up and he’s ready this time.

He doesn’t bother explaining to Natasha in detail no matter how much she prods him. She doesn’t believe him at this point anyway.

Clint follows the man he’s never bothered learning the name of - Partly because he never caused any one of Natasha’s deaths - and corners him in broad daylight with a stake to the throat.

"I know who you are. Or should I say, what."

The man struggles, whimpers and is obviously scared. “Oh my god, please don’t kill me.”

"Clint." Natasha tries but Clint ignores her because he’s finally figured it out. How to make it stop. How to stop losing Natasha.

"It took me a hell of a long time but I figured it out. It’s your M.O. that gave you away. Going after pompous jerks, giving them their just desserts? Your kind loves that." 

Natasha slowly looks from Clint to the man. Unsure now if the man standing before them, shaking with fear was actually even human.

"There’s only one creature powerful enough to do what you’re doing. Making reality out of nothing. Sticking people in groundhog day. In fact, you’d practically have to be a god. You’d have to be a trickster."

"Mister, My name’s Ed Coleman. My wife’s name is Amelia. I have two kids. For crying out loud, I spell ad spa-"

"DON’T LIE TO ME!" Clint presses the stake a little harder. "We’ve killed one of your kind before!"

Natasha and Clint watches in horror as the guy’s face morphs into a familiar one. “Except you didn’t.” Phil says with a smirk.

"Why are you doing this?" Clint asks, furious. He wasn’t afraid to kill Phil a second time if it meant he could save Natasha. 

"You’re joking right?" Phil frowns at both of them. "You jerks tried to kill me last time. Why wouldn’t I do this?"

"And Hasselback. What about him?" Natasha asked.

"He said he didn’t believe in wormholes, so I dropped him in one." Phil shrugged, his eyes twinkling with amusement. "Then you guys showed up. I knew the second you hit town."

"So this is fun for you? Killing Natasha over and over again?"

"One. Yes. It is fun. Did you know there was a lot of ways to kill someone? Because I didn’t. I had to think up creative ways to kill her at some point. But then I went to Google and it’d been very helpful." Natasha raised an eyebrow at that, folding her arms across her chest. "Two. this is  _so_  not about killing her. This one… is on you, Clint. Watching Natasha die… everyday” He smirks at Clint. “Forever.”

"How long will it take you to realize… you can’t save her, Clint. You can’t save everyone." 

—-

Clint wakes up to the sound of  _Back in time by Huey Lewis and the News_. He glances at the clock and its Wednesday.

But Natasha still dies. 

Clint waits. He waits for himself to wake up. to be sent to that same bed. To relive Wednesday or Tuesday. He waits for Natasha to open her eyes. 

But she doesn’t.

—-

It takes him months. 

Months to finally track down the trickster. He’s even thinking that this was another dream and hoping its not. When Phil does speak to him, Clint could only say one word. 

"Please." He begs.

"Please what?"

"Bring her back. Just take us back to that Tuesday- or Wednesday. I don’t care. Bring us back to when all this started. Please."

"This has got to stop, Clint. There’s a lesson here." Phil tells him. All pretenses of laughter gone.

"Lesson? What lesson?"

"This! This obsession of yours! You trying to sacrifice yourselves for each other! When will you learn that nothing good comes out of it? It’ll only be more blood and pain." Phil steps closer to him and for a moment, Clint remembers the serious student librarian Phil played when they first met. He’s gone now, Clint’s sure. All that’s left is the trickster. "Natasha’s your weakness."

"She’s my family. I can’t just stand around and do nothing. Not when I know I can still save her."

"You can move on, Clint. Because like it or not, this is your future. One without Natasha." Phil squeezes his shoulder once before he backs away again.

"Please. Just- Just bring her back."

Phil watches as Clint barely holds himself together. He pitied Clint. Which was why he decided to this in the first place. He could’ve moved when he first sensed them, but he knew what Natasha had gotten herself into and what Clint was trying to do for her. The self-sacrificing idiot. He’d tried. He’d tried to show Clint that he’d be fine without her. That he could still function. That he didn’t need Natasha. 

"Please." Clint tries again.

"Fine. I tried. I tried so hard to save you but you can’t see it no matter how obvious I make it. I give up, Clint." Phil snaps his fingers.

—-

Clint wakes up to Back in time. Natasha is brushing her teeth and throws a snide comment at him. He glances at the radio and happily finds that its Wednesday. Clint moves toward her in three steps and hugs her tight. He’s missed her so,  _so_  much.

"Are you okay?" She eventually asks.

"Yeah. I-" He lets go of her only to look at her beautiful face. "I just had a weird dream."

Natasha looks up at him curiously and asks, “Yeah? Commitment or a job?”

Clint hugs her again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Here on tumblr](http://promptmephlint.tumblr.com/post/109691720101/i-didnt-end-up-studying-today-im-so-fucked)

**Author's Note:**

> [Here on tumblr](http://promptmephlint.tumblr.com/post/99817573361/because-ive-wanted-to-write-this-since-the)


End file.
